We all have stories to tell. Stories about coming out. Stories about first loves. Stories about discrimination, liberation, escape, self-acceptance, pride, shame, faith, joy, regret, being lost, being found and so much more. Some of those stories are inspiring, others are tragic. Some are light and funny, others carry the weight of lessons learned.

Because what is tarot but one huge big story? A choose-your-own-adventure and the graphic novel of your life. The universal story of humanity, shuffled and re-told, over, and over. Cycles of Death and rebirth as The Fool. Confronting The Tower, taking comfort in The Star. A never-ending search for The World or the Ten of Cups. Trials and tribulations, projects, realisations and so many feelings and experiences.

So dig out your tarot deck (or call up your tarot-loving friend). Shuffle though those cards until you recognise yourself. Choose the one that resonates the most for you. It could be any one of 78 magical cards!

For example…

The Knight of Wands, representing how you felt when you first came out and hit the scene.

Two of Swords, showing how you protected yourself when those you loved were not supportive.

The Seven of Wands, depicting how you stood up for queer visibility on your first Pride march.

The Ace of Pentacles, when you finally felt you were living in your ‘right’ gender identity.

The Five of Pentacles, representing how how it feels to be cast out of your home or community.

The Queen of Cups, symbolising how you celebrate your queerness through your art.

Or a card that touched you deep that time when you had *that reading*

Long stories, short stories, poetry, prose. It’s up to you how you want to tell your story. The only important thing is that it incorporates the energy, symbolism, ideas or imagery of one tarot card (if you have more than one special card, you can submit more than once.) Triple bonus brownie points if you include a picture!

Going forwards, I have hopes for a physical tarot deck too! This website forms the basis of a big, beautiful storytelling project… and hopefully, a real, published tarot deck. As the website grows and more and more people contribute, I plan to use submissions to put together something really, really special. The stories might become a book, and the artwork shared, a deck of cards.

Honestly, though? I’m not 100% sure where this will go right now. I know that people keep talking about creating a queer tarot deck. I know that I get a whole load of emails from people asking how and when this can happen.

Beth Maiden is a tarot reader and writer based in Machynlleth, mid-Wales. She has two cats, a hot builder girlfriend, far too many tarot decks and not enough coffee cups.
She's really into bread, the colour red, camping and brand new notebooks. She'd love to cut your hair, read your cards or hang out with you on her blog, Little Red Tarot!

Beth. Beth. BETH. Thank you. This is amazing. This is a thing I have waited for my entire tarot-using existence, which, by the way started when I was just eight queer years old. I’m so excited to share my story and read the stories of others. My ace of cups card overflow’th.

Maybe a kickstarter to help fund the physical tarot deck? I’d throw as much as I could into it, personally! While I’m cis and straight I’m so tired of the heteronormative (and often misogynistic) decks everywhere.

Yay! It’s always been so hard to explain why I love the Empress so much when I’m not really the ‘sit around in fields of flowers’ type. It is because she epitomizes femme for me! The war paintiness of lipstick and the power of lovin your body. She is the original boss-ass bitch! I say again: yay!

Does it have to be very specific to Rider-Waite? Two of the decks I use most often have different card conventions (one in particular has extra cards). Also usually I find connection based on the graphics on the cards and what they evoke.

I definitely submitted something for the original idea of the project and then was going to submit for what it ultimately became but got caught up in all kinds of school and family things. But it’s such a rad awesome wonderful thing and I am absolutely going to come up with something, at some point. Hold me to that.